Tuesday, October 16, 2012

Saturday 13 October was a historical day for OVC in many ways: it was our first ever NVL cup match fixture, as well as our furthest ever away match. We set off early morning to Norwich thanks to careful and stylish organisation by our new Team Manager Gerard. We were to play Norfolk with a squad existing of some well-known in Rune, Anders, Jon, Martijn, Gerard, Gabriele, and OVC debuts for Jamie and Thomas.

A tense start

In the first set, we had to settle down a bit before starting to play volleyball. It went point for point until Thomas served six points in a row to get a deciding lead, and we closed the first set 25-18.

Fighting back in the second set

In the second set we decided to be generous and give them a 7-1 head start. Then Jamie came on to help us get back into it and we fought our way back, Rune and Jamie each serving five points in a row to get in front again. Then Gabriele blocked a few and Jon won a joust. The second set was ours 25-19.

Another impressive comeback

In the NVL and NVL Cup matches are best of five sets, so we had to win another one to take us into the next round. Some good volleyball mixed with poor patches had us chasing the set again. Gerard kept us going with his cheering and set himself up to finish some long rallies. At 19-23 and 20-24 behind, the coach was already thinking about fourth set, until Anders decided it was time to block them several times in a row. Martijn kept serving all the way and a great comeback was complete, set 26-24, and match 3-0!

Celebrating with pasta

The Norfolk team looked after us providing pasta and refreshments, which were well received, before setting off back to Oxford for some late night celebrations.

What next?

In round 2 we will play Malory Eagles in London on Saturday 3 November.Written by Martijn